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Female candidates have triumphed in Afghanistan's parliamentary elections, with one bidding to become the new parliament's speaker. After a delay in counting of more than a month, official results show women secured seats ahead of male candidates in a quarter of the 34 provinces, while in one a woman was outright winner. Before September's parliamentary vote, the first for 30 years, there had been widespread predictions that, due to the conservatism of Afghan society, women would only gain seats through a quota system which automatically reserved 25 per cent of seats for them under the country's new constitution. But women...

Something remarkable happened in Afghanistan this month. The war-torn country held its first parliamentary election in 35 years and 12.5 million people, men and women, were registered to vote.

MEHTAR LAM, Afghanistan — Officials in the eastern province of Laghman deemed Sunday’s Afghan election a success with no polling site violence and more voter participation than last year’s presidential election. Aside from three rockets fired at a platoon of Marines — no one was injured — and an attack on Afghan National Army troops, the parliamentary and provincial council election went smoothly in Laghman province, which is located between the Afghan cities of Kabul and Jalalabad. Initially, fears were that insurgents would attack polling sites on election day, but a Taliban spokesman announced in late August that insurgents would...

KABUL -- Afghans chose a legislature for the first time in decades Sunday, embracing their newly recovered democratic rights and braving threats of Taliban attacks to cast votes in schools, tents and mosques. Violence in the hours before voting began and during the day killed 15 people, including a French commando in the U.S.-led coalition that is helping Afghans build a democracy after a quarter-century of conflict. But there were no signs of a spectacular attack threatened by Taliban militants to disrupt the vote. Sunday's vote was considered the last formal step toward democracy on a path set out after...

Several candidates in Afghanistan's presidential election appear set to drop calls for a boycott of the result. Confusion clouded the historic vote on Saturday when 15 of the 18 candidates alleged flaws in the voting procedure would produce a fraudulent result. But many of their representatives have now told the BBC they will instead accept the findings of an official inquiry into alleged irregularities. The UN has hailed the "massive" turnout in the elections. More than 10 million people were registered to vote, many of them refugees living in Pakistan and Iran. International bodies have endorsed the elections, with the...

KANDAHAR -- The Taliban vowed to turn the Afghan election into a day of bloodshed, but the rebels mounted only a smattering of small-scale attacks on police and civilians and a larger clash that left many of their own dead. After months of what proved to be empty threats, military commanders and ordinary Afghans said Sunday the vote was a serious setback for the holdouts of the hard-line Islamic regime that was driven from power by U.S. bombs almost three years ago for harboring Osama bin Laden. "Yesterday was a big defeat for the Taliban and a huge defeat for...

International observers judge Afghan election fair as some candidates drop fraud charges. Interim president Hamid Karzai is tipped to carry Saturday poll which was mobbed by 10 m voters celebrating Afghanistan’s first democratic election

KABUL, Afghanistan -- While the ultimate winner of yesterday's presidential election in Afghanistan won't be known for at least a month, there's a rare feeling of confidence throughout the battered, teeming capital of Kabul. The 9,000 troops of the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) have been on increased alert all this month, intensified because they really don't have links in the community to tell them when Taliban or al-Qaida zealots plan disruptive incidents. I know not what other ISAF units are up to, but as far as the 700 Lord Strathcona Horse (armoured reconnaissance) and supportive Princess Patricia's infantry are...

First things first - Afghanistan's first ever democratic elections were largely peaceful. This in a country still under the threat of violence from the Taleban, private militias and sparring warlords. And large numbers of Afghans turned out to cast their ballots including, in many areas, many women. But a sudden move to boycott the polls by all the candidates opposed to President Karzai has threatened to cast its shadow over what has clearly been a remarkable process. It followed fairly widespread complaints of voting irregularities - specifically that the indelible ink used to mark voters' fingers and prevent them...

KABUL (Reuters) - Afghans voted Saturday in a historic poll that aimed to give the mountainous and impoverished Islamic nation its first elected president and perhaps end over a quarter-century of war. There were only scattered reports of violence despite widespread fears of attacks by the Islamic fundamentalist Taliban militants, who have vowed to sabotage what they call a U.S.-orchestrated sham. Some injuries were reported but no deaths. By midday, the main election-related problem stemmed from workers using the wrong pen to mark people's fingers after they voted. The ink was not indelible and could be washed off, leading to...

KABUL, Afghanistan - About 90 percent of the Afghan electorate has registered to vote in October's landmark presidential election, the United Nations said Sunday, as it began winding down a registration effort marred by bloody attacks on election staff and voters. According to the latest U.N. figures, 8.7 million of an estimated 9.8 million eligible voters have collected ID cards that will allow them to cast a ballot when polling begins Oct. 9 in Afghanistan's first-ever direct national vote. The enthusiastic turnout is a relief for the world body, which has overcome misgivings about Afghanistan's readiness for elections under strong...

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) - Nine out of 10 eligible Afghans have signed up for landmark October elections, the United Nations said Sunday, a resounding endorsement of a democratic experiment supposed to help Afghanistan turn its back on years of debilitating war.